


I Believe My Heart

by galactic-pirates (stillsearching47)



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-22
Updated: 2017-10-22
Packaged: 2019-01-21 08:00:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12453042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stillsearching47/pseuds/galactic-pirates
Summary: Set after7.01 Hyperion Heights. It's not his problem, he should forget about it and move on, so why does he feel so guilty?





	I Believe My Heart

Henry had thought he was immune to pain. The loss of his wife and daughter had swallowed him whole. He went through the motions but he didn’t - he _couldn’t_ \- feel anything. The world was muted, nothing could touch him and nothing mattered. He was numb, he tried to write because that’s what he did and staring at the blinking cursor at least passed the time, but he wasn’t even frustrated at the lack of words.

He just simply didn’t care.

Then he opened his door and came face to face with a little girl - _“My names Lucy, I’m your daughter.”_ \- and nothing had _ever_ hurt more.

Oh logically he knew that the initial loss had hurt just as much, probably more, but in living with the pain every day he’d grown accustomed to the agony. This, this was new pain, it was like being cut anew, slashed across his heart. He’d _had_ a daughter, this was the universe taunting him, and he couldn’t bear it.

Thinking back later Henry wasn’t sure how he’d managed to maintain his composure when dealing with Lucy, how he hadn’t devolved into a blubbering mess, or worse started shouting at her. It was like the auto-pilot that he’d lived his life on for the last few years had kicked in, it had kept him functioning, but he still felt like collapsing in relief when she’d finally left.

That hadn’t been the end of the story of course.

Retrieving his laptop, and then his car, should have been the end. Yes, he had told Victoria Belfrey where to find her step-daughter and step-granddaughter, but he shouldn’t have to apologize for that. After all, what did he know about Jacinda and Lucy? His experience was that Lucy had run away from home, knocked on the door of a strangers apartment and stolen his laptop. What if he had been a pervert? Ultimately it wasn’t his family drama to get involved with.

He should just wash his hands of the whole thing and never return to Hyperion Heights.

“It’s not my problem,” Henry repeated to himself, folding his hands behind his head as he stared at the ceiling.

The shadows, from the light seeping in around the curtains, was a familiar sight. He didn’t sleep well which is why he preferred to drive, or to sit at his laptop and pretend to write. Laying in bed, with the duvet twisted uncomfortably around him, it just gave him too much time to think. Usually he was dwelling on how empty the bed felt, on how there should be another solid weight beside him, of the curls that tickled his nose and of the cold toes jabbing into his shins. Usually he was straining, listening to the whistling of the wind, and conjuring up instead little footfalls as his daughter ran to their room, her breathing labored from the monsters under the bed, her dolly trailing in one clenched hand.

It had killed him, the months of night terrors she had suffered, of the darkness that she dreamed was chasing her. They had comforted her best they could, read her stories, strategically placed three nightlights so the room wasn’t brightly lit but that there were no sinister shadows. Occasionally they had let her crawl in with them, safely ensconced between them where nothing could ever harm her. Bile filled his throat - something had harmed her, something had harmed them both. It had just been a stupid, senseless accident, nobody but to blame, nothing to do but wail in despair.

No more happy endings.

Sometimes if he closed his eyes he could almost pretend that he could hear the reassuring regular breaths of his wife next to him, he could imagine his daughter safely tucked up in bed, the bedcovers as tangled around her as they were around him now. His wife liked cocooning herself so they had been well matched, it had never bothered him that she had hogged the covers as nine times out of ten he kicked them off during the night anyway.

“It’s not my problem,” Henry repeated once more, it was like a mantra, maybe if he said it enough times he would believe it.

He hadn’t felt attraction or desire since his wife had died. It was a romantic cliché but she had been the love of his life. Well-meaning friends had told him that one day he would move on but he hadn’t believed them. In many ways he’d hoped that he never would because he deserved his pain - he chose this pain - because it meant he hadn’t forgotten. If he moved on then what was there left of his beloved wife and daughter? What was there left to show that they had walked this earth and meant the world to him?

“Jacinda?” Henry whispered, wishing that the darkness would provide some answers.

The moment he had caught sight of her something inside him had shifted. It had felt like déjà-vu, like he was certain that they knew one another but as he has told her - he would have remembered. He didn’t know her, they had never met, so the feeling of familiarity, of this intense need to make her smile just didn’t make sense.

He didn’t know her.

“So why do I feel so guilty?”

Henry sighed and rolled over, his face screwing up in irritation as he kicked the screwed up covers away. His hand fell on the cool side of the bed, the empty side where his wife should be laying and he closed his eyes. Abruptly he turned and bolted out of bed. He all but ran to the window, throwing it open and taking desperate lungfuls of the night-time air.

“I’m sorry,” Henry whispered thickly, the emotion threatening to choke him. He gazed once more at the empty bed, of the dent in his pillow and the perfect smoothness of the other side. “I have to make it right.”

The moment he spoke the words aloud he felt better. The tension which had been killing him subsided and he could breathe again. It didn’t make sense. He didn’t know her. It wasn’t his problem, he hadn’t really done anything wrong, it wasn’t his family drama and he shouldn’t feel guilty. All the logic in the world told him to stay away and get on with his life - what was left of it - but his heart told him what he should do.

He needed to return to Hyperion Heights. He needed to apologize to Jacinda. He needed to make it right. One more day and then the story would be over. A soft snort escaped and he shook his head, he wasn’t even kidding himself with that one. If he returned to Hyperion Heights he was only going to get more entangled, more magnetically drawn in, which was ridiculous. Lucy’s claims burned, the smart thing wasn’t to poke where it hurt, but he just couldn’t stay away.

This story was just beginning.


End file.
